GOOD NEWS TO ALL NATIONS
One of our core values at Hope Church is that we are Outreach-Targeted. “We believe all people
are made in God’s image and are precious to God. Through creative and
intentional efforts, members of HOPE CHURCH seek to build bridges with people
outside the church. The fellowship extends the hope and love found only in a relationship
with God through Jesus Christ. We recognize that much of the Scripture portrays
God’s passion for the poor and needy and endeavors to have our desires in line
with His.”
What is God’s
desire? How can you and I be involved in fulfilling God’s desire? “God desires
all men to be saved and come to the knowledge of the truth.” I Timothy 2:4
(NKJV). God wants even “the wicked people to turn from their wicked ways and
live.” (Ezekiel 18:23). How would He accomplish His desire? It is through you
and me, His Church.
Hope Church is
committed to local and global Missions because it is the heart of God. God
longs for all people to get to know Him. Missions is a command from God. He commanded all
Christians(the followers of Christ) to share the Good News To All Nations.
Mark 16:9-16
Before discussing what and why the Good News is, we
must discuss the bad news. From the first man Adam, in the Garden of Eden, all
humanity has sinned against God. We have rebelled against God and walked away
from him to satisfy our desires.
The scriptures tell us the wages of sin is death. That
is why no matter who you are, we all will die and are destined to go to hell
for eternity. That is the bad news. The good news is God, in His love and
mercy, sent Jesus into the world, who became the substitution for our sins. He
died and rose again on the third day. By doing so, He paid the penalty for our
sins through His blood.
Whoever now believes in Him, by repenting of their
sins, though they may die, will be resurrected at the end of the age to live
with Jesus in heaven forever. That is the good news that we must let everyone
in the world know so that they, too, can avoid hell and go to heaven.
I.
Good News To All Nations.
The New Testament contains four gospels: Mathew, Mark,
Luke, and John. Why are they called gospels? The English noun gospel comes from
the Anglo-Saxon term Godspell, meaning “glad tidings.” It is translated from
the Greek evangelion, which means “good message.” Originally, the word was
related to news of military triumph. But when the New Testament was recorded,
its writers assigned the term gospel to the “good news” of salvation in Jesus
Christ.
The four gospels are good news because they contain the
exceedingly wonderful message of God’s redemption of sinful humanity through
the death and resurrection of His Son, Jesus Christ. At the time of Jesus’
birth, the angel proclaimed, “ I bring you good news or glad tidings that will
bring great joy to all people. The Savior, yes, the Messiah, the Lord, has been
born today in Bethlehem.” Luke 2:10-11.
On his eighth as per the Jewish tradition, Jesus was
taken to the temple to be dedicated. There was an old saint of God named Simeon
who had been waiting for the Messiah to come into the world, defeat the evil
one, and set people free from their bondage to sin and death.
Upon taking baby Jesus into his arms, Simeon
prophesied Luke 2:29-32, “Sovereign Lord, now let your servant die in
peace, as you have promised. I have seen your salvation, which you have
prepared for all people. He is a light to reveal God to the nations,
and he is the glory of your people Israel!” Jesus, the light of the world, will
show God to all the nations (all people).
Jesus accomplished the Mission of God by seeking and
saving the lost souls. After He rose from the dead, he met his eleven disciples
and commanded them, saying, Mark 16:15-16, “Go into all the world and preach
the Good News to everyone.
Anyone who believes and is baptized will be saved. But
anyone who refuses to believe will be condemned.” The disciples preached the
Good News everywhere they went. Now, that mission has been passed on to us.
God loves all people regardless of culture, gender,
religion, and nationality. How would people come to believe in Jesus and get
saved unless we share the Good News with them? Romans 10:13-14 (Living Bible) “Anyone
who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved, but who can ask Him to save
them unless they believe in Him and how can they believe in Him if they have
never heard about Him and how can they hear about Him unless someone tells
them.”
Hope Church is committed to praying and supporting those who
are preaching the Good News to all nations (all people groups) that have not
heard the Gospel. Missiologists say that, of the approximately 8 billion people
on planet Earth, about 3.2 billion are considered unreached or least reached.
More than 7,000 people groups are classified as unreached.
If you follow Christ, you have no excuse not to share.
You are automatically enlisted in the Mission of God. We pray, and as and when
God calls and leads, we go to share the Good News with people living in the 10/40
window or coming from that region.
The 10/40 Window is located from 10 degrees south to
40 degrees north of the equator. There are 69 nations across northern Africa,
the Middle East, and Central Asia in the 10/40 Window. Nearly 4 billion people
live here, including 90 percent of the world’s poorest of the poor. It is
estimated that 1.6 billion of these people have never had the chance to hear
the Gospel of Jesus Christ – not even once! The seat of every major
non-Christian religion – Islam, Buddhism, Hinduism, Animism, Atheism, and
Sikhism – is headquartered in the 10/40 Window. Two-thirds of the world’s
population (4 billion) live in the 68 nations of the 10/40 Window.
God is bringing people from around the world to the USA. They live in
our neighborhoods. It is our call as Christians, the followers of Christ, to open
our hearts to strangers who look different and may not speak our language and
share the Good News of the Gospel. I pray that at Hope Church, we will be
passionate about sharing the Good News to all Nations.
